Volume 48, Number 16 · October 18, 2001
College: The End of the Golden Age
By Louis Menand
1.
Except for a brief contraction in the early 1990s, the higher education system in the United States has been growing steadily since the late 1970s. Roughly half of all Americans now have attended college at some point in their lives, and roughly a quarter hold a postsecondary degree. (In the United Kingdom, by contrast, less than 15 percent of the population goes to university.) There are 14.5 million students in American colleges and universities today. In 1975 there were a little over 11 million; in 1965 there were fewer than 6 million. And yet when people in higher education talk about its condition and its prospects, doom is often in their voices. There are three matters these people tend to worry about: the future of the liberal arts college; the 'collapse' (as it's frequently termed) of the academic disciplines, particularly the humanities; and the seemingly intractable disparity between the supply of Ph.D.'s and the demand for new faculty. There are more college students than ever. Why does the system feel to many of the people who work in it as though it is struggling?
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